Fernando Alonso recently came to the rescue of Stoffel Vandoorne when he said that his past teammates had been further off him than Stoffel is currently.
“I think it’s difficult to beat me,” Alonso had joked.
“He always has to be a little bit behind. But if you see previous team mates, they were a lot further behind than Stoffel. Like in 2014 or something like that, it was six or seven-tenths to Kimi every race. He’s less than that now.” he added.
And what Alonso was saying wasn’t just a shot in the dark. His assessment of Vandoorne is spot on, as pointed out by Mark Hughes’ analysis.
Vandoorne has actually been just 0.195% off Alonso this year, edging out Fischella from the 2006 season.
“Other team mates have been further off me than Stoffel,” said Alonso. It’s true. Here are the numbers: Vandoorne (’17)+0.195% Fisichella (’06)+0.224% Grosjean (’09)+0.386% Massa (’11)+0.427% Massa (’10)+0.460% Räikkönen (’14)+0.549% Fisichella (’05)+0.550% Piquet (’08)+0.598%” Mark Hughes of Motorsport magazine tweeted.
Now, one fact that needs to be taken into consideration here is that the McLaren isn’t quite allowing Alonso to unleash his full potential, while his previous teams were giving him that luxury. But then again all circumstances were same for both drivers in question.
Fernando Alonso is currently toying with his fans as he is about to make a massive announcement about his future today.
